Trump Fires Back After CNN’s Cuomo Starts Interview With Attack

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump apparently felt blindsided by Chris Cuomo’s initial line of questioning Monday on CNN’s New Day. Cuomo is the son of the late New York Gov. Mario Cuomo and the brother of current Gov. Andrew Cuomo, both prominent Democrats and Clinton supporters.

Cuomo began his interview by asking Trump, “You are attacking Hillary Clinton for the sexual past and indiscretions of her husband, calling her an enabler. We have a panel of independent voters. They are smart as heck, and most of them don’t like it. They see it as a distraction, they see it as hypocritical coming from you, and mostly they see it as potential proof that you may have no real ideas to offer as president. What is your thinking on this line of attack?”

The question seemed to ruffle Trump’s feathers and the presumptive GOP presidential nominee fired back, “Well this is a nice way to start off the interview.” Trump stated he felt like Cuomo should have started off the interview with pleasantries such as congratulating Trump for winning the Republican presidential primary race. “I thought, you know, at least there would be a small congratulations, but I’m not surprised with CNN because that’s the way they treat Trump,” he said. “You know, they call it the ‘Clinton Network,’ and I believe that.”

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Cuomo tried to reset the line of questioning but Trump looked to be in control of the conversation after firing back at Cuomo. Trump stated his criticism of Clinton’s complacency with husband Bill’s infidelity was just one of the distinctions he drew between the two candidates.

Trump’s comments then focused on Clinton’s promise to put coal miners out of business and his own vows to help veterans and treat them better than illegal immigrants, and to bring jobs back to the U.S. by focusing on making good trade deals. NAFTA, as Trump stated to Cuomo, was a “complete disaster,” and added Clinton pushed strongly for the NAFTA deal to be passed. “All we end up getting (from NAFTA) is unemployment of great people,” Trump contended.

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Cuomo said, “Why don’t you talk about those issues and get women onto your side as opposed to talking about infidelity and enabling?” Trump answered, “Chris, I spoke very little about that compared to other things,” and asserted that CNN chose to pull out that one critical comment from all of his policy-related remark. Trump told Cuomo that Clinton is “playing the women’s card to the hilt,” adding that he believes he will do very well with female voters in November. “Women understand it better than anybody,” Trump said.